


eulogy for yangyang's severed brain

by fructoseintolerant



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Science Fiction, Angst and Tragedy, Artificial Intelligence, Bombing, Explosions, Flashbacks, Gen, Implied/Referenced Terrorism, Memory Loss, Non-Linear Narrative, Suicidal Thoughts, Unethical Experimentation, slight body horror
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-02
Updated: 2021-02-02
Packaged: 2021-03-17 02:56:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,961
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28592862
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fructoseintolerant/pseuds/fructoseintolerant
Summary: Yangyang boards the train. The train explodes. Yangyang dies.Now : repeat
Relationships: Chittaphon Leechaiyapornkul | Ten & Liu Yang Yang
Comments: 9
Kudos: 53
Collections: Challenge #4 — Awaken The World





	eulogy for yangyang's severed brain

**Author's Note:**

> based on source code (2011)

Yangyang waited as the door separated itself to make way for him and the rest of the people behind him to board the train. He tapped against the concrete platform. He peeked at his wristwatch. A little past seven. He should be okay. School starts at eight. He gripped his backpack strap and stepped forward when the gate opened.

As usual, he searched for his 'designated' seat. A bit further from the door. It was no longer unoccupied. A man with a hat covering the upper half of his face was seated there. Already comfortable with his luggage beside his leg. Yangyang looked down on him, then to his surroundings. The other seats were already taken too.

He sighed and grabbed the handle above him. It was going to be tiring, he mused. Yangyang continued the song that had been paused and bobbed his head according to the rhythm.

Between the beats and the harmony, Yangyang noticed something was wrong with his shoes. Untied shoelaces. He frowned, but bent down on the dirty platform to tie them. He could see the people behind him—upside down. And he saw the man on his 'designated' seat had gone. Yangyang smiled. He could finally take a seat.

He was straightening his back—walking towards his seat when he was faced with blinding lights and hot waves of air. The force of it sent him flying. An explosion.

And then black.

Yangyang woke up with a gasp. Blindly he reached for his own body, touching everywhere. He was still intact. No explosion. Only a bad dream. Yangyang rubbed his face and sighed. What a nightmare.

The alarm on his nightstand rang, it was already time for him to go to school. He began his day with a premonition.

Yangyang waited as the door separated itself to make way for him and the rest of the people behind him to board the train. He tapped against the concrete platform. He peeked at his wristwatch. A little past seven. He should be okay. School starts at eight. He gripped his backpack strap and stepped forward when the gate opened.

As usual, he searched for his 'designated' seat. A bit further from the door. It was no longer unoccupied. A man—with a hat covering the upper half of his face was seated there. Already comfortable with his luggage beside his leg. Yangyang looked down on him, then to his surroundings. The other seats were already taken too.

He sighed and grabbed the handle above him. It was going to be tiring, he mused. Yangyang continued the song that had been paused and bobbed his head according to the rhythm.

Between the beats and the harmony, Yangyang noticed something was wrong with his shoes. Untied shoelaces. He frowned, but bent down on the dirty platform to tie them. He could see the people behind him—upside down. And he saw the man on his 'designated' seat had gone. Yangyang smiled. He could finally take a seat.

_"Wait!"_

Yangyang tilted his head like a confused puppy. "Huh?"

_"Look behind you closely."_

"What-"

The blinding lights came back. Yangyang never got his answer. The explosion came sooner and he died.

Yangyang woke up with a gasp. Body arching off the bed. When he came back to his senses again, he was face to face with the ceiling of his room. Familiar. Yet left a strange feeling on his mind. He could recognize this room, but something was definitely off.

He groaned. His head felt weird. Floating. Thoughts running endlessly. Unrelenting.

He glanced sideways to his nightstand, waiting for the alarm to ring again. But the alarm wasn't there anymore. Only a telephone. Antique. Certainly not his. Nor that he remembered that his mother ever bought it. The sky was still dark—Yangyang could see it even with the closed curtains.

And the phone rang.

Warily, Yangyang picked up the phone. "Hello?"

_"Hello, Yangyang."_

Yangyang covered his eyes with his arms, blocking his sight. He recognized the voice. "You killed me in my dream."

The line was silent for a few seconds before it spoke again. _"I'm sorry."_

Yangyang should've been scared about it. The fact that this stranger knew about his dream and called him in the middle of the night without any possible explanation. But instead, he found his heart beat steadily, no rushed breathing. No adrenaline to be found in his bloodstream. Only calmness. 

It irked him.

"Who are you?"

_"Have you forgotten again?"_

"This is our first time talking." Yangyang kneaded the soft sheets under his clammy hands. Even after being here for sixteen years, this room felt strange. Not yet accustomed.

_"No,"_ the voice said. Stern. _"This is your forty ninth. Now sleep again."_

Yangyang blinked once and opened his eyes to the view of the closed gate of the train. Behind him, people rushed to get in. Pushing him inside. But he knew. He knew what would happen if they got in. 

If he got in.

He tried to stop them. But it was a futile attempt. No matter how hard he willed his legs to stay, they still strided to the same place. And he still found his 'designated' seat occupied by the same man. He couldn't move aside from what had happened before in his dream. It was meant to be. _For him to be dead._

_"Look around, Yangyang. Carefully observe your surroundings,"_ the voice came up again. Even without the phone, the voice still rang through his head. No cable whatsoever.

"What do you want me to see?"

_“Everything you can.”_

Yangyang still bent down to tie his shoelaces. The bomb still exploded.

Yangyang woke up with a cry. He didn’t wait for the phone to ring for him to pick it up. He screamed to the phone, no actual words. Only him screaming in frustration and panic. Scared. Only after his screaming stop that the voice answered. Gentle, careful as it said, _“Yangyang?”_

Yangyang sobbed into his hands. Phone clutched into his head as he pulled into his own hair. 

_“Yangyang—”_

“I’m scared. I’m really scared,” Yangyang said into the phone. He backed away from the night stand. Only as far as the cable attached to the phone allowed him to. He backed away until his back met the headboard. Bringing his knees to his chest, Yangyang sobbed again, “I don’t even know you. _Please_ end this nightmare.”

_“Oh, well,”_ the voice said. Hesitating a little. _“I’m Ten. I’m a… friend.”_

“What’s the meaning of all of this, Ten?”

There was a void that deepens with every second Ten wasted to stay silent. As if it was the plothole that Ten missed in the first place. Stretching until Ten pulled out the scissor. _“You’re gifted, Yangyang. You could predict the future.”_

“The future?”

_“You could prevent the bombing only if you could identify the terrorist. You have to help them, Yangyang.”_

Yangyang swallowed hard. His erratic breathing had gone normal again. “Is that true? That I could prevent that explosion?”

The line paused for a second. Total silent. Yangyang should’ve heard something. The wind, maybe the tree branches hitting his window, or _anything_. But no. The night was too silent. His own breathing was overpowering. 

_“Yes. You could prevent it, Yangyang. Only you could.”_

“Then how long should this nightmare continue?” Yangyang asked, closing his eyes. Trying to shake away those images.

_“Until you succeed. It won’t stop until you succeed. Are you ready to start again?”_

Yangyang remembered those faces. The students with different uniforms from him. The business women and men that were too busy with their phone to notice their surroundings. The grandmother and her granddaughter on their way to the market. The people around him that were about to die. Him, too.

“Yes.”

Yangyang could hear Ten gulping. Nervous. Yangyang didn’t understand why. It was him who was going to face the bad things. Not Ten. How dare he?

_“Alright, okay,"_ Ten said. There were sounds of clicking from the other line. Click clack, click clack, followed by the soothing voice once again, cracking at the end of simple sentence. _"Now sleep, in three, two-”_

The door opened to reveal the empty passenger car. But it was alright. Dozens of people behind him were there to fill up the empty spaces.

They pushed him inside, the clock—ticking on their wrists and the one on the station—told them to hurry up. 07.06.

Yangyang passed the aisle of seats, walking towards his seat. But stopped when he saw that it was occupied by a man. He relied on what he saw for a fraction of second to observe the man.

His hand reached for his phone and continued the song. 

Yangyang didn’t smile when he saw the man left. He could never sit, he knew.

Instead, his eyes followed the man. View still upside down as the man ran away from the luggage he left. The man went to another passenger car, running away. Faintly, Yangyang could see him turning around, hat accidentally dropped to the platform to reveal his face. And then came the blinding lights.

Yangyang was instantly back to his room. The image of himself suffering from the explosion was visible from the glass window. His scared expression flashed on the reflection before the window broke into pieces. Along with his body. He rubbed his bleary eyes.

He whispered to the empty room—knowing too well Ten could catch his every breath—“Again.”

Yangyang waited as the door separated itself to make way for him and the rest of the people behind him to board the train. He tapped against the concrete platform. He peeked at his wristwatch. A little past seven— _07.06_. He gripped his backpack strap and stepped forward when the gate opened.

He boarded the train. Along with many familiar faces. 

He looked around. The business men and women were still busy with their job through the phone. Yangyang could catch a glimpse of their screen. Stock today. Negative. He looked around again. The students were busy with their textbooks. It looks like there’ll be exams later. Yangyang wanted to tell them : _why bother?_

But he kept his mouth shut. It was his job to keep them alive after all.

The girls in uniform kept giggling, gossiping. About what Yangyang didn’t know. His mind was filled with only one thing. Finding the perpetrator and saving the whole train from getting blown up by catching the perpetrator before he could blow this train up. Again, he watched the man stand up from his seat from his periphery. He watched as the man went and bent down to tie his shoelaces.

Before he could see it clearly enough to imagine the face again, the blinding lights showed up rather quickly.

Yangyang slowly opened his eyelids. Taking a deep breath, he murmured. “Again.”

Yangyang had lost track of time. He couldn’t remember the trial numbers again. It continued on and on. Him facing the nightmare that ended with the explosion and telling Ten whatever he saw there. Bits of information. No matter how small. The name he saw on the phone of the business man while he scrolled down, the time shown on his watch, the weather, and the faces he saw. 

Sometimes he tells Ten what he remembers from the past. His family. His friends. His real dreams. Sometimes secret. Because that's what friends do, telling a secret and keeping it for life. And everytime he did, Ten would say sorry to him. Yangyang never knew why he was sorry.

This was one of his secrets : "I'm tired. I don't even know how many times I've ‘died’ at the age of 17."

It was Ten who reminded him. Voice soft as he spoke through the phone. _“Seventy. The next is going to be seventy first.”_ Ten had said it as a trial number.

Yangyang sighed.

_“It’s my favorite number and I have a good feeling about this. It has the word 'first' on it. It should be good, you’re doing good Yangyang. C’mon,”_ Ten urged him.

“Why seventy first?”

_“Seventy one reminds me of someone I knew,”_ Ten said.

"Know?"

_"Knew."_

Yangyang went quiet. The room was even more quiet. These days—or times, Yangyang wasn’t so sure anymore—he couldn’t recognize this childhood room of his. “I understand.”

_“Are you ready?”_

"Where are you, Ten?" Yangyang had asked him before Ten could start the countdown.

It made Ten hesitate. _"I'm just a part of your imagination. Can we start—”_

"What it's like there?"

Hesitant. _"Bright."_

Yangyang chuckled. He peeped at the closed curtain and saw nothing behind the window. Only endless black spreading through the horizon. "Lucky you.” Yangyang lied back to the soft bed, huffing soft breath. Around him were dolls, they were last seen when he was eleven, but strangely they came back when he woke up for the nth that day.

Ten spoke again, _“Are you ready?”_

Yangyang closed his eyes. “I have no choice, don’t I?”

Ten didn’t answer. Flipping the buttons and starting the countdown, he whispered, _“Sleep in three, two, one-”_

Yangyang opened his eyes slowly. He had been here numerous times. Yet, he couldn’t help the dread filling his frail self. This dream of his, he didn’t want it to come true.

Yangyang waited as the door separated itself to make way for him and the rest of the people behind him to board the train. He tapped against the concrete platform. He peeked at his wristwatch. A little past seven. He gripped his backpack strap and stepped forward when the gate opened.

As usual, he searched for his 'designated' seat. A bit further from the door. Imagine how disappointed he was when he found it was no longer unoccupied. A man—with a hat covering the upper half of his face was seated there. Already comfortable with his luggage beside his leg. Yangyang looked down on him, then to his surroundings. The other seats were already taken too.

He sighed and grabbed the handle above him. It was going to be tiring, he mused. Yangyang continued the song that had been paused and bobbed his head according to the rhythm.

This time, he paid full attention to the man in the hat. The perpetrator. Before the man left his seat, Yangyang was already watching him from his periphery. He gulped. He glanced at the luggage he left. The bomb. The man stared out the window. 

Yangyang widened his eyes. He could see it. The reflection. Faint, but evident. Yangyang could never forget the face. In between the fleeting building and streets visible from inside the train, Yangyang saw the perpetrator’s face. Sadness visible on his face.

He clenched his jaws and balling his fists. His legs wouldn’t move no matter how hard he tried. His mouth too, stayed still—even when all he wanted was to shout : _there is a bomb inside this train_. This was a scenario he already faced many times. Nothing could change this nightmare.

His hands shook when he tied his shoelaces. Quietly, he braced himself. As usual, the bomb exploded.

Yangyang covered his eyes with his forearm. Silently crying. Wetting his sleeve.

“I found him, Ten.”

_“Can you tell me about him, Yangyang?”_ Ten asked, hopeful.

Yangyang lifted his hand towards the empty ceiling. No reason. Just felt like it. Feeling no wind ever graze his wet sweaty palm. He grasped nothing and went on with life. Wetting his dry lips with his spit, he started describing the bomber. Ten praised him endlessly while he stared at the face on the screen, fitting to what Yangyang had described. Bringing back bad memories wasn’t the hardest part.

This was : “Ten, what day is it?”

_“It’s Wednesday, 6th August.”_

Yangyang chuckled. He inhaled and exhaled deeply, feeling oxygen filling up his lungs. _Fake_.

“I see. So it has already happened. The bombing.”

There was a shuffling on the other line. The hushed whisper and the frantic clicking.

( _"What did you tell it, Ten?"_

_"I don't—"_

_"Add another dose."_

_"No! He'll die—"_

_"Ten, it's still listening," another unfamiliar voice said._ )

Ten gulped. "What?"

“I saw it, Ten. The date of the explosion,” Yangyang said. He recalled the date perched on the top of the daily stock market website on their phone. “28th July,” he breathed out in a laugh. He didn’t know why it ridiculed him.

He sighed. He didn’t know why he sighs so often recently. Tired, maybe. Ten hasn’t said a thing. Yangyang would’ve thought that Ten wasn’t listening if it wasn’t because of the sound of Ten’s soft breathing resonating.

“These dreams, are they all my memories?” Yangyang turned to his side, facing the closed curtain, sick of the ceiling.

“Did I die?” he asked again.

On the other line, Ten inhaled deeply. _“No. Not yet.”_

“Can I—” Yangyang choked out a sob. “Can I be dead now? I’m kind of tired, you know,” he said, trying to force out a laugh to brush out his tears. But his cry kept overpowering.

Ten knew it was a lie. They kept pumping the oxygen to the brain inside the tube. Only cutting off slightly when the time to ‘dream’ comes. But still neon blinking question marks against the black computer screen daring him to answer. 

Ten took a shaky breath before he leaned closer to the microphone.

“You can. You can now, Yangyang. Well done. You may sleep now.” 

Ten wiped his tears and whispered to his colleagues—the men in white alien suits—but the microphone was still on, still broadcasting to the floating brain inside the tube. “It’s done.” They nodded. Plugging off the life support, letting Yangyang rest.

“Shutting down in three, two, one—” 

**Author's Note:**

> special thanks to user ao3 [boyfrendery](https://archiveofourown.org/users/boyfrendery) for beta-ing this fic! and thank you for reading!


End file.
